


In Deepest Night

by Junaril



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Cover Art, Crypticfic, F/F, Femslash, cryptic fluff, sapphic cryptids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 21:09:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20552741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Junaril/pseuds/Junaril
Summary: Thuringwethil senses Lúthien in Tol-in-Gaurhoth.Both find a mysteriousness and comfort in each other that they haven't before. It lasts for the night and is forgotten by day, as their paths divide again and they move on. Still, this moment may last forever, in memory or feeling.





	In Deepest Night

**Author's Note:**

> I find Lúthien & Thuringwethil to be one of my favourite ships. Both when I imagine them separate or together there is a lingering cryptic feeling to them which I wanted to explore here.

She came in deepest night.

Dark would the hour have remained had the faint moonlight not found itself in her.

A hound accompanied her, yet no sound. No footsteps sounded from the ground she walked upon. She would have been as hidden on her path as the cruelties committed in this stronghold that lay before her, as hidden as the victims that never left this fortress.

But she was seen and sensed by the woman of secret shadow, a mistress of reports and tidings, of whispers and glances. High she stood, in a tower that was her own, at a window that knew only her silhouette. She commanded her tower and only she decided what whispers were to come to her ears. Here the wind blew so strong and cold no mortal man could endure for long, but here the wind was hers, the coldness was she herself, and her immortal prowess was at its peak.

She saw in deepest night.

A figure, both the fairest and the darkest was there under the silver moon and the many black cascading shadows of the towers. Her dress of fabric as light as falling leaves would have surely danced around her ankles in the mild winds of her elven home, her heavy coat of thickest hide and fur would doubtless satisfy quivering limbs in any place but this. But this was Tol-in-Gaurhoth, the only movements here were beating arms and legs attempting to run - here a mind was never milder than when it was curious. And the mistress of secret shadows felt curiosity build inside her. One that tingled, that made her limbs remain - yet - idle and her eyes stay set on the figure.

In this pale night Luthien was the palest. The glow of the moon found itself in the roots of her dark hair and flowed softly down her strands, and her skin seemed to shine its own shy light. But like the very shadows of Tol-in-Gaurhoth was her hair itself, and her movements - perhaps her intentions as well.

So Thuringwethil thought and wondered, and watched on as the figure slowly progressed, cautious and determined, making no sudden movements, no frantic looks, having no thoughts of retreat. Thuringwethil found herself entranced, looking for and focusing on the smallest motions her eyes could perceive. She saw the slight brush of the elf maiden's hand on her cloak, the floating strands of hair caught by a rare blow of wind, a sudden glow in her eyes reflecting a light source - and something inside those very eyes. Thuringwethil imagined herself close enough to catch Luthien's eye and envisioned feeling her unfamiliar hair on her own face, touching her skin with her own fingers. This close she herself would be in reach of a touch, a brush, a scrape.

The vision subsided. The craving did not. And it was as if she had to retreat into her skin again. She decided to end her watch as she realized that she was tarrying in her duties. She put a foot out into the air and the abyss below.

They touched in deepest night.

When the moon still hung high and faint above them, and the towers were still billowing statically in their dreadful shapes - and where they stood unseen.

When Thuringwethil thought she would tower over Luthien with her dark stature, but Luthien had a terribleness of her own all her enemies were made to see eventually - and so they stood as unlikely equals.

Thus when they both stood so close to each other Thuringwethil felt she was nigh to tremble. If it was a trembling born of fright or something else she could not tell. She could tell, that she was idle again. But she wanted this moment to stretch and for them both to linger in it. So - she regarded her.

Luthien cupped the hilt of her sword that rested at her side and hidden by her cloak - unmoving, undecided. She stood there, her feet like stone and her face a mask, curious and cautious of this moment and her opposite. And so was Thuringwethil, her talk of duty showed to be a frame of dust. Perhaps both were aware of eath other's confusion, perhaps both only sensed their own.

Thuringwethil took in the sight of Luthien. No wind was here to caress her elven cheeks, no branches to play with her hair. So, Thuringwethil thought, she had to do the part herself.

The mistress of tidings closed what little distance was left. Her lips hiding her sharp teeth twitched as if a jolt ran through them. But she herself could not tell if she was attacking, as she was proceeding step by step with her long fingers outstretched. Thuringwethil's eyes caught _her_ eyes, and in them flickered something intense yet detached she hadn't seen before and in Luthien's calm stature was a hunger that put a blush on Thuringwethil's cheeks. Her hands cupped the elf maiden's face, ready to crush or stroke it, ready to abandon it again for something else, but determined to remain until the sensation of her skin on Luthien's was carved into her memory. Thuringwethil heard her own voice finally leave her lips, heard Luthien give a witty reply and felt herself smile wide as she saw Luthien's form responding, sliding into her touch.

Luthien's skin was cold from wandering through the night, but her blood moved ever warmly in her veins. Thuringwethil's blood could have resembled ice, only slightly concealed by the warmth that lingered on her skin, caught of the eternal and cruel fire she accompanied. Luthien scraped almost cruelly, almost apologetically across the skin with that illusionary warmth. But Thuringwethil welcomed the sensation, she wanted to be searched.

The hound stood and watched silently beside them. A being of the background, with bestial eyes of a strange wisdom, both mirroring and piercing its surrounding. And patiently waiting. Thuringwethil found these haunting orbs and looked back at the eyes she _wanted_ to see, she wanted only them to see.

So she took her into the sky, spun their embrace in the moonlight until she saw every corner of the elf maiden's face illuminated. She took her to her tower, into its shielding frame and solitude, and with the moon behind her gushing its light on their secret forms, she saw her own figure cast a shadow on Luthien's frame.

Luthien lay with her cloak underneath her in Thuringwethil's shadow and the shadowy illusion her own hair had. And with Thuringwethil covering the moon and encompassing her view Luthien could forget for a while. She could hear, for a while, only the sounds she wanted, sounds between them and sounds they made, in a space remarkably bereft of the noises and whispers of the world she had set her journey in - and would eventually return to. She took the ends of her garments on her chest and drew them open.

Again Thuringwethil's hands rested on burning cheeks, her fingers brushed skin and lips and the occasional strand of hair that had the shade of the shadows she so loved. She would find the cold lingering on Luthien's body and turn it, rub and kiss it into heat. The hands she took into hers were stiff and lacked in sense due to the cold, the fingers resting against her own were rigid and slow. Still they had their own motions and they tapped on the corner of Thuringwethil's mouth. She tilted her head and her lips tended to them, licked the salt and dirt away until at last the cold disappeared. Until she tasted naught but the skin itself, and it was soft and warm again.

Luthien lifted herself up and pushed against Thuringwethil. Both now knelt, facing one another and Luthien brushed back the peculiar hide and silk Thuringwethil was clothed in. Her hands soon discovered -

"You are cold. Everywhere." Except -

She moved her hand to the source of Thuringwethils own warmth, a lonely fire that was found among and surrounded by the coldness her body was made of, and her hands spun bursts of heat. The fire erupted into Thuringswethil's limbs and through her breath into the air. Luthien's own hand clung to the heat it found.

Thuringwethil had herself moved and discovered by Luthien, and Luthien by Thuringwethil in return. Because as much as she loved to receive, she loved to give - her whispers and secrets at other times and to another; now it was a different kind of secret and a different sound of whisper.

Luthien's lips parted with a deep and slow sigh that touched her opposite's ear. Thuringwethil would long thereafter remember the sound and feeling of it, the softness and the wordless care of another body, the kindred attention of another mind. And she would soon lose her hide to Luthien. Luthien would soon realize the pain that came with the memory of a night that would never happen again. And she might always have, might never name the feeling of loss deep inside of her.

Both would long thereafter bury their memory to exist again in different places with different people.

But now they found themselves close and closer still.

They were in deepest night.

Two spirits of different kinds, but of the same unrest and hunger. And the coming day would forget this liminal moment.

**Author's Note:**

> Fic and Art can be found on [Tumblr](https://junaril.tumblr.com) as well


End file.
